What alarm and what misfortune, then must you think all nations are threatened with by this law, when decemvirs are sent all over the world with supreme power,—men of the greatest avarice, and with an insatiable desire for every sort of property? whose arrival will be grievous, whose forces will be formidable, whose judicial and arbitrary power will be absolutely intolerable. For they will have the power of deciding whatever they please to be public property, and of selling whatever they decide to be such. Even that very thing which conscientious men will not do, namely, taking money to abstain from selling, is to be made lawful for them to do by the express provisions of the law. From this provision what plunderings, what bargainings, what a regular auction of all law and of every one's fortunes must inevitably arise!

Even that which in the former pert of the law made in the consulship of Sulla and Pompeius was strictly defined, that they have now left at the discretion of these men, without any restriction or limitation. He orders these same decemvirs to impose an exceedingly heavy tax on all the public domains, in order that they might be able both to release what lands they choose and to confiscate what they choose. And in this proceeding it is hard to see whether their severity will be more cruel or their kindness more gainful. However, there are in the whole law two exceptions, not so much unjust as suspicious. In imposing the tax it makes an exception with respect to the Recentoric district in Sicily; and in selling the land, he excepts those with respect to which there was an express provision in the treaty. These lands are in Africa, in the occupation of Hiempsal.